Lyme Disease Diagnosis

Lyme disease is a clinical diagnosis—based on your medical history, symptoms and exposure to ticks. Because the typical Lyme disease diagnostic tests are so insensitive, a negative test result does not mean you don’t have Lyme. There are many reasons why someone who actually has Lyme may have a negative test result. There may not have been time for antibodies to develop; the immune system may be suppressed; or the person may be infected with a strain the test doesn’t measure.

Lyme disease is known to inhibit the immune system and 20-30% of patients have falsely negative antibody tests.

Lyme Disease Diagnosis and Testing Highlights

LLMDS consider the specificity of the particular bands that test positive for a patient.

Although the CDC requires 5 of 10 bands for IgG surveillance purposes, 2 of 5 bands have specificity of 93-96% and a sensitivity of 100%. (Engstrom 1995).

56% of patients with Lyme disease test negative using the two-tiered testing system recommended by the CDC. (Stricker 2007)

The College of American Pathologists (CAP) found that ELISA tests do not have adequate sensitivity to be used for screening purposes. (Bakken 1997)

52% of patients with chronic disease are negative by ELISA but positive by Western blot. (Donta 2002)

Learn More About Lyme Disease Diagnosis Testing

Tests can not only help to diagnose a disease, but also to manage an illness. A good test can help a doctor assess the severity of disease, estimate the patient’s prognosis, monitor the course of disease progression, stability or resolution, detect relapse, and select drugs or adjust therapy. Unfortunately, a test with this capability does not exist for Lyme disease. To learn more about specific tests, visit: Lyme Disease Tests.

LymeDisease.org has developed a Lyme disease symptom checklist to help you document your exposure to Lyme disease and common symptoms for your healthcare provider. You will receive a report that you can print out and take with you to your next doctor’s appointment that may be helpful in your Lyme disease diagnosis.